


maybe (you might come back home to me)

by Medics



Category: Captain Marvel (2019), Captain Marvel (Marvel Comics)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Pre-Canon, Canon Compliant, Childhood Friends, F/F, Gen, Implied/Referenced Abuse, Implied/Referenced Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-03-25
Updated: 2019-03-25
Packaged: 2019-12-07 08:09:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,818
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18232214
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Medics/pseuds/Medics
Summary: Maybe her life begins on a warm day in 1969 when Marie Danvers comes knocking at the door of the Rambeau family home with a quiet request and a spindly blonde girl standing just in her shadow.





	maybe (you might come back home to me)

**Author's Note:**

> Buckle in, y'all. We're making a journey from pre-canon all the way to Endgame.  
> Title from "Maybe" by Janice Joplin.

> _“Listen,  
>  how your heart pounds inside me.”  
>  \- Wislawa Szymborska_

* * *

* * *

They say she’s gone.

_Must’ve burned up in the fuselage._

A charred half dog tag is all that remains of Carol Danvers.

And Maria refuses to believe it. She would realize it wouldn’t she? Couldn’t she _feel_ Carol die without needing to be told? The words, when they’re muttered with insincere, political sincerity during a half redacted debrief, still feel like a blow to the gut. The wind rushes out of her all at once.

_Gone._

She feels lied to. And the bile in the back of her throat burns as she bites her tongue to avoid saying as much.

If it were the truth, Maria thinks, with no small amount of guilt as she runs her fingers through Monica’s hair later that night, then more than one life just ended.

* * *

Maybe her life begins on a warm day in 1969 when Marie Danvers comes knocking at the door of the Rambeau family home with a quiet request and a spindly blonde girl standing just in her shadow.

Maria watches through the porch’s screen door, the girl’s blue eyes darting curiously around the entryway as she leans out from her hiding place behind her mother’s legs. When she finally catches Maria’s eyes it’s with a bashful smile and a scuff of her sneaker against a peeling floorboard. Maria matches it with a mostly toothless giggle and a tug at her mother’s pantleg.

After another minute of conversation, Marie Danvers leaves the girl with a kiss to the top of her head and a wave which goes unreturned. The girl watches her mother go with sad eyes which startle wider at the sound of Maria’s mother finally swinging open the porch door.

“Maria, baby, this is Carol.”

Her mother knelt in the doorway between the two girls, a gentle hand on each of their shoulders.

“We’re going to look after her for just a bit.”

The profundity of the statement lost to the summer afternoon, Carol scrubs at the unshed tears in her eyes, crossing her arms defensively at the words.

“Why don’t you take her out to the backyard and you girls can play while I whip up something for lunch?” It’s more gentle order than a suggestion and Maria nods her understanding. Satisfied, her mother turns back inside, halting only when a tiny voice pipes up,

“Can we have peanut butter and banana sandwiches?”

It’s Carol who says it, posture timid, mouth drawn with seriousness, but eyes bright and alive with determination. So it’s Maria who bursts into a grin, “Peanut butter and banana sandwiches are my _favorite!_ ”

And Carol finally breaks, the corners of her mouth lifting sweetly, and the two are off, the events that brought them together lost to the dust trailing Marie Danvers’ Station Wagon.

* * *

They’re inseparable.

With years gone by, summer days spent together turned to sleepovers so often Carol has a toothbrush in the bathroom and more clothes in a dresser drawer in Maria’s bedroom than in half her closet at home.

_Home._ The word is messy to Carol.

It’s neither here nor there. Her father’s boots stamping up the front steps. A slamming door. Her brothers’ cries. The gentle lull of Maria’s mother reading the next chapter of _Watership Down_ as she and Maria sit, enraptured on the porch swing. The wet warmth of a Louisiana night as they traipse around the yard, catching fireflies in the mason jars left over from canning jam.

In the Danvers’ household, Carol lurks in her family’s shadow. Outgrown, overlooked, eclipsed by everyone else. Her accomplishments are nothing compared to her brothers’ athleticism, her mother’s apathy, her father’s next drink.

But with the Rambeau family, Carol has a place.

So, when the they pack up their brand-new Oldsmobile to head to Northshore in the cloying heat of August, Carol is there, ball cap pulled low, elbowing Maria in the side as they wait for Maria’s parents to load the last of the supplies into the boot of the car.

“Just because you’re seven months older doesn’t mean you can ride in the front seat.”

The seven months (“and twelve days”) is something Maria will never let go, lording it over Carol at every opportunity. And if it’s not so different from the two inches over Maria that Carol celebrates every time Maria’s mom measures them against the doorframe, Carol refuses to admit the likeness.

So, _expectedly_ , Maria folds her arms with a smug smirk, “Daddy said I could once I turned ten.”

“Now, Daddy better have said nothing of the sort.” Monique Rambeau is descending the steps, lugging a full cooler, arching an eyebrow with practiced precision at her husband over the curve of her sunglasses.

Charles is a broad-shouldered man, his years of military service evident in a straight-backed posture and the slight drag of his left leg, though the stricture never quite reaches the warmth of his eyes. He lets loose a loud guffaw.

“Sorry, baby, Momma knows best.”

Maria huffs indignantly, Carol is sure, but the sound is lost to the sound of a car tearing up the drive, kicking up dust in every direction as it speeds toward the house.

And, turning to look, Carol’s thinks her heart might just stop.

Because it’s her dad’s black Pinto racing toward them.

He’s half out of the car before it even lurches to a complete stop. And she can tell from here that he’s drunk. She doesn’t need to look into his glassy eyes or hear the gruff slur of his voice to know for sure. He’s always had a good way of hiding it, though, and he doesn’t stagger as he makes a beeline toward Carol.

And maybe Maria’s dad can tell because he’s there in the path, intercepting Carol’s furious father with two strong hands on his shoulders, “Joe, what’re you doing here?”

“You takin’ my daughter away, Chuck?” He leans past the man holding him like a vice to leer at Carol.

And Carol matches his gaze for as long as she can.

But then, Carol can only half see what’s happening because Maria’s taken a step mostly in front of her, chin up, quietly defiant. She reaches back behind her with one hand, which Carol takes, intertwining their fingers with a hard squeeze.

“We talked about this a few weeks ago at the bar, Joey,” Carol hears, more than sees, Maria’s dad say, his tone gentle. “We’re only goin’ down to the coast for a couple days. You said it was okay if we brought her along. Has something changed?”

It wasn’t true, of course. It was their _mothers_ that had confirmed these plans two weeks back over a morning cup of coffee on the porch as the girls milled about in the front yard picking wildflowers. Given the news, flower picking turned to excited shouting turned to scheming as they planned out how to make enough money to buy the best souvenirs on their trip.

“Nah. A’course not.” Carol’s father seems torn. As if hesitating against his own memory, he shakes his head as he pulls farther out of the other man’s hold, “I just don’t-”

“Then why don’t you hop on back in the car and let Marie drive you home?”

And that’s when Carol finally notices her mother, sitting in the passenger’s seat, staring resolutely ahead. The driver’s side door is still swung wide open, leaving no room to pretend she could remain unaware of the brewing commotion outside the car.

And Carol feels sick to her stomach.

“You know what? Fuck you, Chuck.” The anger cuts back in so quickly, Carol feels it like whiplash across her spine. “I can drive my own goddamn car.”

Her father storms back to the Pinto with just as much anger as he approached with, stopping just before he climbs in the driver’s seat.

“Let’s keep pretending she’s your kid, huh, Chuck?” He says it with a lofty wave of his hand, a smirk cut across his face, “Cause really only you could raise such a _fucking_ disappointment.” Carol doesn’t look to see his ugly sneer, her attention otherwise occupied. Her face burns as she looks to her mother again, the wisp of a wish that she’d say something in Carol’s defense as fleeting as it is potent. But it never comes and her silence is deafening.

Joe Danvers salutes the group before slamming his door shut, speeding back down the driveway quicker than any man with even half a drink in his system should. And the yard is silent once more, the excitement of the mid-afternoon whisked away on the hot summer breeze.

Maria’s mom finishes packing the car as the girls sit on the porch steps, pretending not to listen when Maria’s father steps back inside to “call a friend down at the station”. He reports a suspicious black Ford Pinto swerving down the 49.

And Maria doesn’t let go of her hand until they’re well past Baton Rouge.

* * *

They’re at a party.

Worse, they’re at a house party hosted by the newly crowned state champion Lafayette Howlers. The overabundance of football players, PBR, and trashy showboat records is such a stark contrast to their usual Friday night that Carol has to laugh. The only time she’s ever pretended to give a shit about football was back when she still thought she could use the common thread of interest to weasel her way into her father’s good graces. But she’s beyond that now and can’t even pretend to care about state records and turnover percentages.

Maria, on the other hand, has spent the better part of an hour draping herself over first string quarterback Dexter Armstrong. A reason for the sudden, _vested_ interest in football, then.

She’s perched on the arm of a drab, unappealing couch, Dexter pulling her tight against his side. And Carol rolls her eyes with gusto at Maria’s too loud laugh, an odd pit forming in her stomach as she watches the pair. Draining her last swig of watered-down beer, Carol decides she’s had quite enough of the show. Making her way through throngs of rowdy, drunk teenagers, she cuts through the back door and into the starkly humid night. When the door slams behind her, nobody is outside to comment.

It’s dark as she plants herself in the grass some way away from the house. Winter nights in Louisiana always teem with a certain restless energy, as if the damp air is anxious for the leaves to change and drop in a way they couldn’t quite manage in the wet warmth of fall.

Laying back and looking up, the stars grant Carol some of immediate calm the night can’t offer.

But there’s a buzz that remains just beneath her skin, bothered and angry and maybe something else.

She’d only really noticed it last year. They’d been in the library, goofing off more than studying for their midterms when Maria had blurted it out in a single breath,

_“I got asked to Winter Formal.”_

And Carol had felt the words like a weight dropping out of her chest, all the air in her lungs going with it.

Outside of the time Jimmy Cunningham had caught her in the gut with his elbow trying to tag her out at second base, Carol had no memory of anything quite like the feeling. And, worse still, this time it was completely unwarranted. There was no physical blow. They hadn’t made plans. Maria wasn’t bailing on her. She was just going to some shit school dance with some sweet-faced joe from their math class.

And she had looked anxious sitting across from Carol, gently wringing her hands to abate the silence, eyes glued to the table in front of her. So Carol squashed the feeling down, locked it deep down where it could die forgotten, and raised an incredulous eyebrow,

_“The Maria Rambeau, going to a school sanctioned event? Unheard of. A scandal in and of itself..”_

At that, Maria had finally looked up, smacking Carol on the arm, laughing that full bellied laugh that seems to be reserved for just the two of them.

And Carol had felt the feeling back, abstracted, warm. Like the sun got trapped just beneath her sternum.

She can still feel the burn of it when Maria finds her outside the party somewhere between ten minutes and three hours later, time having lost its form around three drinks ago.

"Carol?” Maria calls her name like it’s not the first time she’s done so.

Carol hums a noncommittal response.

“Where’s your head at?” She plops down gently in the grass, a plastic cup of something strong-smelling sloshing over her hand as she does so.

“In the clouds.” Maria smiles down on her at that, leaning just over to encapsulate Carol’s field of view. A halo of stars surrounds her and Carol thinks she’s probably never seen something so beautiful. It’s the exact sort of thought she’s been working hard to ignore as they’ve become more common over the past months. If jealousy had come first, the recognition of a deeper attraction had not been far behind.

And Carol thinks it’s only a matter of time until she slips up and says something she’s bound to regret.

“What’re you thinking so hard about?”

“The future.”

“What about it? We’ve had the whole thing planned out since the fourth grade.” Maria says it with such certainty. And it’s true.

When Carol used to lay in the grass like this with her brother, he’d tell her stories about the constellations. Long, sprawling tales only an older brother could make up. And every time she would ask him where she fit in his epic narrative. And he’d laugh unapologetically when she’d say was going to be up there in the stars one day.

And so, when Maria’s dad came in for a career day presentation in the fourth grade, wearing his blues and talking about _soaring_ across the countryside, Carol decided that she’d found her fast track into the sky.

“What if we don’t get in?”

_Or what if you change your mind?_

It’s a pressing thought Carol refuses to vocalize, fearing if she does it might just come true.

“You know I’d go anywhere with you.”

It’s said with such a tender honesty that Carol’s breath catches in her throat.

But her lips are loose, “What about _Dexter_?”

Her body feels too hot against the wet grass, face burning as she says it.

“What _about_ Dexter?” Maria laughs at the purse of Carol’s brow, “C’mon, what’s your problem with him anyway? Is it the abs? Are you jealous?” She mocks with understanding nod of her head, lips curled into a fake pout.

“He’s so arrogant... and bullheaded. And to top it all off he’s a _complete_ smartass…” Her eyes roll deep into the back of her head with an uncoordinated loll as she sits up to finally face Maria.

“So, what you’re saying is I have a type.” Maria’s burgeoning smirk loses no power as she pushes a lock of hair behind Carol’s ear. She doesn’t pull her hand away either, leaving it to rest solid at the back of Carol’s neck, fingers twisting through the sweat damp hair at her nape.

Carol thinks maybe she’s had too much to drink because her blood feels like it’s on fire and it seems like Maria is getting closer. Their foreheads knock, but nobody moves to pull away.

And maybe Maria _is_ pressing delicately closer, her nose brushing Carol’s, careful not to disturb the fragility of the moment. Carol can’t be sure. But the buzz is back, and she feels it like a warm hum beneath her skin, lingering and licking through her nerve endings.

So, she presses forward.

And the back door of the house slams open with a resounding _crack_ against the siding. Light pours out over the grass like spilt milk and the commotion from inside lacks the same liquidity. It’s jarring and jagged, as unwelcome as the face that peers out from the doorway.

“Maria? Are you out here?”

It’s Dexter, squinting out into the pitch black of the yard.

“Don’t stay out here too long, alright?” Maria’s already turned away as she goes to stand, wiping her hands hastily on her jeans as she trips her way back toward the door and inside. And Carol wishes more than anything that she’d had the presence of mind to turn and look at Maria before she left. To see if any of what she was feeling was reflected in those dark eyes. To try to understand what the hell just happened.

_Almost_ happened.

But the moment is gone, the night calm again as the door closes, the distant scream of cicadas half drowning any noise from the party still trying to seep into the quiet.

And Carol?

Carol thinks she’s well and truly _fucked_.

**Author's Note:**

> My first fic and I decide to go multi-chapter semi slow burn childhood friends au?  
> What kind of virgo antics...


End file.
